That's Right: McCain-Feingold Doesn't Apply

By None:

The new campaign finance rules have politicos doing backflips creating new 527 organizations, saying "I approved this message," and all kinds of wackiness.

But, it seems that McCain-Feingold was in the sausage-maker (er, Congress) for so long that they completely forgot the Internet, leaving it more-or-less completely unregulated. That's right -- all that old, evil soft money has a new home: Online.

And they don't even have to avoid their friends on the Kerry campaign. Says reform advocate Fred Wertheimer, "They [the FEC] appear to have exempted any Internet communications from the definition of 'coordination,' thereby in theory allowing campaigns and parties to coordinate on communications." (See 'McCain-Feingold's Internet Loophole' by Chris Suellentrop.)

Why would the FEC make such a ruling? Well, in their own words, "Unlike media such as television and radio, where the constraints of the medium make access financially prohibitive for the general population, the Internet is by definition a bastion of free political speech." (PDF)